MU's Army ROTC inducts nine veterans into Hall of Fame

COLUMBIA — Maj. Gen. Enoch Crowder, a professor of military science at the University of Missouri from 1885 to 1889, was among the first class inducted into the MU Army Reserve Officers' Training Corps Hall of Fame on Friday.

Trained as a lawyer, Crowder devised the Selective Service Act, or the draft, during World War I. Crowder Hall, headquarters of the ROTC program at MU, was dedicated to him in 1940. His great-great-nephew, John Siebert, accepted the award during a ceremony in Jesse Wrench Auditorium.

ROTC is a college-based program for training future military officers, according to MU's ROTC website. It started with the Morrill Act of 1862 which provided federal land grants to colleges in exchange for requiring military training of all male students. In the 1960s, ROTC participation became optional. Today, it provides scholarships in exchange for a set number of years of required military service.

Other inductees were:

Retired Lt. Gen. James Campbell, a 1971 graduate of ROTC who commanded a United Nations force in Somalia;